


Operation Best Boyfriend Ever

by PrincessMeganFire



Series: AHS Requests [4]
Category: American Horror Story, American Horror Story: Hotel
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bridal Style Carry, Death Day Anniversary, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, John is the big spoon, M/M, Spooning, sad JPM
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-07-26
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:53:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25537642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrincessMeganFire/pseuds/PrincessMeganFire
Summary: It’s the anniversary of James’s parents deaths, so James falls into a small depression that John doesn’t quite know how to work with.
Relationships: James Patrick March & Liz Taylor (American Horror Story), John Lowe/James Patrick March, Liz Taylor (American Horror Story) & Iris
Series: AHS Requests [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1850470
Comments: 1
Kudos: 13





	Operation Best Boyfriend Ever

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lyra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyra/gifts).



> Sorry that I left the tickling part of the request out, I wasn’t quite sure how to write it in.

It was that time of year again, the time of year when James has no idea why he was so upset and angry. He hated his parents - why was he upset around the anniversary of their deaths? If it was any consolation, he should he grateful, he should be happy, they made his childhood a living hell. It didn't stop him being upset, though.

Five A.M, Friday the twenty-ninth of August, the anniversary of Mr and Mrs March's suicide. James remembered what the people said, that it was his fault, if he wasn't such a let-down, such a failure, such a wimp, maybe they wouldn't have done it. Maybe they wouldn't have lifted those guns and shot each other where they lay, waiting for their son to find their corpses on the bed they'd conceived him upon. 

Rumours had spread all across the city, that James had killed them, that a slave or servant had, maybe even the police. The people that mattered, James, the police themselves, they knew it was suicide. They were all that mattered. But in a world we're James was already isolated? It suddenly got a lot colder from then on out.

XX~•~•XX

"James, we need to get up, Liz and Iris wanted to go over a couple of new room designs with you." John whispered to his boyfriend, lazily wrapping an arm around his waist under the duvet. Though he himself didn't need to leave, there was no way James would if he didn't.

James let out a tired huff and turned to face John in their bed, a small pout on his face. "Can't we do it tomorrow? I really can't be arsed to do all that work today.” John looked down at his boyfriend, concern stretching over his face. James wasn’t one to just drop his work, in fact, on any other day he’d already be up and gone. No matter what the work was, James was willing to go no further nor any less than perfection, and that counted for everything, including checking out room designs. For him to be... less than already in the rooms with the designs was a concern for John.

“Baby,” he whispered, slipping back into bed and spooning James from behind. “What’s going on? Why don’t you want to work?” He began to trail kisses along James’s collar bone, voice deep and quiet but loud enough for James to hear. “I’m just not in the mood.” The ghost replied, eyes rolling and shuffling out of John’s grasp. Well, that was new. James lapped any and all affection like a cat would milk, for it was not a common occurrence in his youth. Now John was offering it to him, offering him all his affection he could muster within that moment and James didn’t want it. He didn’t want any of it. Something was definitely wrong, and John was determined to find out. He would never say it out loud, but every time John seemed about to unlock something new about James, his mind almost always created a name for what he was about to do. Today’s name? Operation Best Boyfriend Ever (though John admittedly used the same title for a high school boyfriend but hey, being in a relationship with an eternal ghost made him feel young again, and he was determined to be the best boyfriend he could for James).

“Hey, I know you wanna be left alone, but we should at least meet Liz at the bar to tell her if you’re not feeling up to it.” John muttered, pulling himself out of bed once more. “Can’t you just do it when you get there? You’re still doing the work.” James grumbled, dogging his head further into the pillow.

If James had his way, then John would be our doing his work, checking the room designs and going over things with Liz and Iris because he knew James well enough to know what he would agree and disagree to. That way also, James could stay in bed, hide away from the world, shrouded in darkness, until this dreaded day was over. 

The fact that James didn’t even need sleep apparently hadn’t occurred to either boyfriend that morning as John attempted to lure James out of bed by pulling the covers off him completely, leaving James moaning from the lack of warmth and writhing at the top of the bed. His eyes were closed and if he could fall asleep, well, he was certainly trying hard enough to make sure he would.

“Liz and Iris will be upset baby, you don’t want Liz and Iris to be upset. Iris is very emotional, you know that, and Liz will beat you with her heels until you actually somehow manage to get bruises.” John joked, pulling James by his arms to sit up. “I don’t believe in such hysterics: they work for me, why would they be offended by my choice of how to run things? And Liz would never beat me with her heels, she likes me too much to do that.” John chuckled, taking a seat next to James, discretely sliding one arm under his legs. As he kept his boyfriend talking, he eventually managed to pull him up into a bride style hold, carrying him against his protests to the bar.

That was another thing: James’s clothes rarely ever altered - why would they need to? And with the logic of his ghostly powers affecting his attire, the fact that he had spent hours in a bed fully dressed in his most common outfit of choice: a suit, the clothes were wrinkled in any way, even looked fresh from the shop window. One good thing about this was that as John was carrying James, he still looked flawless and like he was intending to come out in the first place.

XX~•~•XX

Liz and Iris were huddled over the design ideas as John appeared carrying James up to the bar, the ghost still not looking too pleased but his arms wrapped around Johns neck for safety precautions (not that he needed any). 

Watching the two of them, something seemed off, Liz felt something nagging in the back of her mind, though clearly Iris didn’t feel the same way as she merely cooed at the couple as John came to sit on one of the barstools and hold James tightly in his lap. 

Finally, through a lot of squinting and the squeezing of her own fists, Liz remembered. Liz remembered and her face feel and her guilt rose because James had given her everything when he let her stay here permanently, a home, a family, because no matter what the Countess could have given her, James was in charge and therefore had the final say: James had said she could stay. Liz was loyal to James like no other, despite the banter and arguments and insults that would suggest she hated him more than the Countess hated losing Valentino. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, pulling the designs closer to herself and folding them all up to put away. Iris looked at Liz curiously, still clearly not understanding what was going on. John could see Liz knew something, something she wouldn’t share easily, and James just didn’t care. He even curled up closer to John, something he rarely did in privet and never did in public. Something was going on, and John felt helpless as he clearly knew that in this situation he was as clueless as Iris, and nobody wanted to be as clueless as Iris. 

Liz began making the men a drink each, heavy alcohol despite the early time in the morning, and made one last apology and even hugged James before pulling a still very confused Iris away, the designs tucked under one arm and the disappearing voices of the two women in a conversation that sounded like: “Tomorrow... we’ll do it tomorrow... I prefer the blue... let’s use this time to go over... I think we made a mistake in room...” until the two voices disappeared completely.

John shifted James in his lap so that he could see his face, and as soon as he did, he wished he hadn’t. James looked completely and utterly miserable, and not even that, he didn’t even look like he knew why. Like he was just having a bad day. James didn’t have bad days, and if Liz knew something then it was clearly more than a bad day, because why would James go to Liz if all it was was a bad day?

“I can feel you thinking,” James muttered, sipping his drink slightly. “I’d prefer if you had anything to say that you said it out loud, the silence is far too deafening in here.” For once, John knew what James was on about when he said something so bizarre as this - the silence was deafening. “I just want to know what’s going on, I care for you baby, I don’t like being left in the dark.” John murmured, rubbing his hand up and down one of James’s arms, the one not occupied by alcohol. James shrugged. “It’s not a regular thing, I can assume you that, but I must say that upon this day every year I tend to feel... emotions, emotions I thought I’d let go of years ago, and every year I hope I’ve finally gotten over it but... alas, I never appear to have done so.” He sounded so downcast and hurt that John could barely comprehend what he had said. Thinking it over in his mind, John knew this was something personal, something that James wouldn’t have shared willingly, meaning that Liz either found out by walking in in the situation or one of James’s apparent “annual bad days” or she somehow fought it out of him, which John doubted seen as he couldn’t imagine why she’d know that James had anything to hide in the first place.

As if reading his thoughts, James brought a hand to John’s cheek and said: “Liz found me a couple of years ago, wallowing in my own self pity. She didn’t think much of it, simply helped me get back into the days activities, and has helped me through this day every year since. I don’t often spend time with our queen as much as I’d like, but I have to admit that the times we do share together are those which will always be turned into the brightest of memories for me when the majority of mine shine so black.” Another thing John has gotten used to: when James got upset, he often tended to drag out his sentences, make them sound more poetic or like an extract from a novel, simply because he didn’t know when to stop. John found it endearing, adorable even, and if it weren’t for trying to pry information out of James, he would have allowed himself more time to appreciate it.

“Mind if I ask... what’s so bad about today?” John whispered, his arms tightening around James’s waist. “Well, you see... it was this day many many decades ago that my parents... passed.” John wasn’t quite sure what to think, James never talked about his past, much less his family, more so choosing to focus on the future and how to make it “more splendid than the past could ever hope to be, the pessimistic time of shit”. 

“I’m sorry James, I really am. I’m not entirely sure what to say-”  
“Don’t say anything.”  
“But-”  
“It’s not your fault, just leave it. Want to come back to bed with me?”  
“I’d like nothing more.”

Operation Best Boyfriend Ever was complete.


End file.
